


hiraeth

by ifthebookdoesntsell



Category: The Prom (2020), The Prom - Sklar/Beguelin/Martin
Genre: F/F, Kelby - Freeform, Limited Discussion of Underage Drinking, Post-Canon, greenelan - Freeform, someone call for some kelby?, the summer before college
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-18 19:00:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29738412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifthebookdoesntsell/pseuds/ifthebookdoesntsell
Summary: It’s the end of summer before freshman year of college, and they-- Emma, Alyssa, Kaylee, and Shelby-- decided to have one last hurrah. And then, somehow, Nick and Kevin showed up too.Emma and Alyssa are cuddled up in the love seat, tangled up in each other as they always seem to be lately as Kaylee checks one last time that her parents won’t be home tonight.“Hey.” Shelby taps her as she returns from refilling her drink. “Put your phone down.”Kaylee looks at her doubtfully, though her gaze immediately softens. “I just have to make sure my cousins don’t come to check. They’ll be pissed and tell.”(Or, their last get-together before they're off to college.)
Relationships: Alyssa Greene/Emma Nolan, Kaylee/Shelby (The Prom Musical)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 41





	hiraeth

**Author's Note:**

> hey y'all! back again already lmao. here's a little something i wrote based on [this](https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMe2EyToD/) snippet of song from a tiktok i saw lmao. it's shelby/kelby centric with a whole bunch of greenelan.  
> i hope you like it. 
> 
> here's a [kelby playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0rWdfkqU2h12Z3cEfPVU68?si=nZhOjbovTnSnZg0xxiLIcA) that i made, if you wanna take a listen while you read. 
> 
> (hiraeth: a combination of homesickness, nostalgia, and yearning; a deep and irrational bond felt with a time, era, place, or person; a longing for a home, a moment, a feeling that cannot be returned to, no longer exists, or maybe never was.)

Everybody’s a little tipsy. 

It’s the end of summer before freshman year of college, and they-- Emma, Alyssa, Kaylee, and Shelby-- decided to have one last hurrah. And then, somehow, Nick and Kevin showed up too. 

Emma and Alyssa are cuddled up in the love seat, tangled up in each other as they always seem to be lately as Kaylee checks one last time that her parents won’t be home tonight. 

“Hey.” Shelby taps her as she returns from refilling her drink. “Put your phone down.” 

Kaylee looks at her doubtfully, though her gaze immediately softens. “I just have to make sure my cousins don’t come to check. They’ll be pissed and tell.” 

“They won’t,” Shelby says gently, draping herself over the arm of the couch and flopping down next to her best friend, upside down so that her hair is brushing the floor. “Back me up here, ‘Lys.”

Alyssa unsticks herself from where she had her face pressed into Emma’s neck to look over at her friend. 

“What?” Emma’s hands are innocently on her hips, though her thumbs moving in gentle circles over the soft skin just under her t-shirt. Alyssa reddens as she shifts a little. “Can you repeat the question?” 

“Tell this one that her parents said they’d be home Sunday, so they’ll be home Sunday.” Shelby points up, a little haphazard in her movements due to the alcohol in her system, at Kaylee who’s now looking down at her fondly, in a way that makes her stomach flip even as she tries to ignore it. 

“Your parents are nothing if not sure about their schedules,” Alyssa affirms, giggling softly when Emma tickles her. She nudges the blonde away before she turns back to her two best friends. “Come on! Have fun! Grab yourself something to drink.”

Kaylee’s lips twitch. “Alyssa Greene? Telling me to grab a drink?”

Alyssa rolls her eyes. “The only reason I never drank at high school parties is because I didn’t want to end up kissing Emma on accident if the liquid gave me too much courage.” 

Kevin laughs. He looks up from where he and Nick are playing Drunk Madden on the TV, which is mostly just them yelling unintelligibly when one of them scores and doing their best to traverse the field in a single play. 

“Yeah, same. The reason I never drank is because there are too many hot guys around this place.” 

Everybody stares at him. 

“Excuse me?” Nick asks first. He’s not the ignorant guy he once was, but the words come as a shock anyway. Kevin is his best friend, afterall. 

“You heard me.” The boy grins, already turning back to his game. “Emma, your cousin is hot, by the way.” 

Laughter dissolves through the room, an easiness spreading. 

This is how it always should have been, spending time together, talking, moving a little closer to drunk with each new secret unveiled. 

Shelby watches Emma and Alyssa once more, notices the tension leaving her ex-boyfriend’s-- and still best friend-- shoulders. They’d decided on a breakup when they realized they’d be heading to different parts of the country. 

At the thought, she looks back at Kaylee, who’s nursing a drink again. They’ll be far away from each other, too. 

Kaylee smiles softly. “What?” 

“Nothing,” Shelby replies, though her heart speeds slightly when Kaylee reaches over to place her drink on one of the coffee table coasters and flips around until she’s lying with her hair kissing the floor too, head lolled to the side slightly so she can meet their eyes. 

“Tell me!” Kaylee says curiously. 

Shelby flushes, quickly mumbling about the first thing that comes to mind. “Just thinking about the second prom.” 

It’s the truth. It’s almost all she thinks about, lately. She can’t get out of her head Kaylee in her dress, hair done up pretty and nice, can’t get over the feeling of them pressed so close when the spiked punch started really getting into their system. 

She remembers dancing the night away, not worrying about the time for once. 

She felt like a princess that night, more than she ever had in her cheerleading uniform or during the first prom, which she regrets every day of her life since it happened. 

Her gaze flickers to her other best friend and her girlfriend, watching as Emma laughs at something Alyssa said, as Emma rolls her eyes and smiles. She notices the softness of Alyssa’s very being, the way she’s held so tight that it’s almost impossible to tell where one of them ends and the other begins. They seem to have a firm hold on their happiness, seem to know how to keep it close, even, press it gently into the other until there is no room for regret, no room for anything but the pure love that sits between them with every breath. 

It’s as if the world stops when it's just them. 

“What about the second prom?” Kaylee prompts, pulling her from her thoughts. 

Shelby’s attention snaps back to the girl’s face. Her heart catches, swings around on her ribs and does the monkey bars. 

There’s a different look in Kaylee’s eyes, a simultaneous wonder and sureness, a quiet understanding and the perfect kind of joyful screaming. 

Shelby already knows that nobody’s ever looked at her like this. 

She’s suddenly at a loss for words. There’s too much to say, not enough time, too much of the future coming fast and life continuing to rush by even as she wishes that it would stop. And yet, she knows that her world will continue to turn, even when Kaylee is in California and she’s in Chicago.

That’s what terrifies her the most. 

She longs for a different world, one where she is braver, one where the liquid courage in her system was enough, where maybe she’s tangled up with Kaylee on the other end of the couch like Emma and Alyssa. She’s nostalgic for a time that never was, one that will now never exist. 

“It was the best night of my life,” Shelby confesses quietly, finally answering the question. “I’ll never forget it.” 

Kaylee nods in agreement, blindly grasping for Shelby’s hand to link their pinkies together. “Me neither.” 

For a moment, they smile at each other, knowing that this is their definition of forever, a soft moment on the couch before their lives begin, knowing that this is a memory they’ll return to in the future, wondering what could have been. 

All of the sudden, Shelby feels utterly intoxicated by premature loneliness, utterly weighed down by this heartbreak that doesn’t even exist, not really. 

There’s a kind of time travel about it, about knowing they’ll look at each other this way when they’re older, too, when they have new lives and new friends, and pretend whispers of possibility hadn’t ever rang through them in moments like this.

“Shelby?” Kaylee whispers softly. 

She swallows hard, staring back at her, eyes dark and intelligent. “Yeah?”

“I love you.” 

Shelby’s heart stutters at that. She doesn’t know how Kaylee means it. She doesn’t want to know. She tucks the words away for later, basking in their indefinability. 

“I love you too,” she murmurs. 

Kaylee grins. “Good.” 

Shelby nods. “Good.” 

There are no other words, no _maybes,_ no _ifs._ One day, things might change. One day, one of them might learn to be brave. 

But for now-- the quiet declaration, the soft stares, their pinkies curled together in a promise-- it feels like enough. 

**Author's Note:**

> hey there! thanks for reading. what did you think? if you enjoyed, consider dropping me a comment/kudo down below. i love hearing from y'all. 
> 
> the alternative title for this fic was "maybe, almost, see you soon", so i would like to think that this isn't the end for them. i hope you agree!
> 
> as always, i'm @ifthebookdoesntsell on tumblr. my askbox is always open for whatever you've got on your mind. 
> 
> be safe out there x


End file.
